Climate solutions Exchange receives £500,000 investment

CSX uses a combination of drones, satellites, ground truthing and detailed carbon analysis and modelling to measure carbon. Combined with extensive knowledge of land management, effective sequestration methods and reforestation, the company applies machine learning to deliver an accurate measurement of sequestration which can learn and improve further with time. CSX is the first company in the UK to make this technology accessible, and helps its partners to make important ecological decisions with certainty and confidence by providing a verifiable audit trail.

The investment will particularly help CSX with the development of its lidar software, an industry-first platform which uses drone technology to improve the accuracy when calculating the amount of carbon sequestered by above ground biomass. By detecting the size and surface area of individual trees, the platform is able to develop a more accurate understanding than existing technologies of how much carbon is sequestered. At present, current satellite technology provides inaccurate carbon calculations given it is both weather dependent and limited to resolutions of generally 10m and at best 25cm for the most expensive satellite derived data.

The CSX drone system uses a resolution of 1.5cm.

Commenting on the investment, Sir Edward Milbank, Director of CSX, stated: "CSX's purpose is to help develop a trusted carbon market, offering land managers a fair return for environmental management and giving businesses a transparent, verified carbon offset. We started CSX because we saw glaring inefficiencies in the current carbon market and identified an opportunity to provide the technical infrastructure that businesses and landowners need to measure carbon in a more accurate and transparent way. We will help our partners to make important ecological decisions with certainty and confidence by providing a verifiable audit trail. This audit trail is essential for a global and fair carbon market."

With regards to the timing of the investment, Nick Maughan added: "Now could not be a better moment to be investing in CSX. With increasing demand for, and commitment from, the business community to prove their ESG credentials, CSX is best placed to provide that verifiable data. The current approach to offsetting which came out of the Kyoto Protocol was a good first step in encouraging businesses to address their emissions but was not designed for the level of demand or accuracy the world now needs in its fight against the climate emergency. Coupled with the UK's departure from the EU's Common Agricultural Policy and recent introduction of the Environmental Land Management Scheme to incentivise sustainable farming practices, we are very optimistic about the positive long-term growth of CSX and its technology."

Andy Howard, CEO of CSX Carbon, who will be speaking at the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow next month, also welcomed the investment. "Ahead of the world's most important summit on climate change, this investment not only signals a great vote of confidence in our business but also the support of technology which has the potential to make our businesses and our planet more sustainable in ways we have never seen before."